Mr. Jorge Bergoglio

40th Congressional District of California

Mr. Jorge Bergoglio

40th Congressional District of California

Why Me?

Born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, I worked briefly as a chemical technologist and nightclub bouncer before beginning seminary studies. I was ordained a Catholic priest in 1969 and from 1973 to 1979 was Argentina's provincial superior of the Society of Jesus. I have come to the United States in order to propose a reformation of both party platforms to have a higher regard for human life and dignity. Because the 40th District of California is home to a large percentage of Argentine Americans, I believe that I will be a good representative of their beliefs and ideals on a large stage.

Policy Issues

Education

School is one of the educational environments where one grows by learning how to live, how to become grown-up, mature men and women. … Following what St. Ignatius teaches us, the main element in school is learning to be magnanimous … This means having grand ideals, the desire to achieve great things in response to what God asks of us and, precisely because of this, doing everyday things, all our daily actions, commitments, and meetings with people well. We must educate the poor and the marginalized even if that means cutting the staff at some of their schools in wealthier neighborhoods. They have something that youth from rich neighborhoods do not through no fault of their own: they have the experience of survival, of cruelty, of hunger, of injustice. They have a wounded humanity. And I think about the fact that our salvation comes from the wounds of a man injured on the cross.

Economic Policy

When we idolize money, our economy is reduced to a consumerist outlook dedicated to the pursuit of material things, which sustains itself through a culture of waste: waste of time, waste of God’s creation and waste of human lives — because we "labor for the food which perishes” instead of “for the food which endures to eternal life” (John 6:27). It is, therefore, necessary to create lifestyles in which the quest for truth, beauty, goodness and communion with others for the sake of common growth are the factors which determine consumer choices, savings and investments

Abortion

The moral problem of abortion is of a pre-religious nature because the genetic code is written in a person at the moment of conception. A human being is there. I separate the topic of abortion from any specifically religious notions. It is a scientific problem. Not to allow the further development of a being which already has all the genetic code of a human being is not ethical. The right to life is the first among human rights. To abort a child is to kill someone who cannot defend himself.

Quote from the GOAT

There is a need for financial reform along ethical lines that would produce in its turn an economic reform to benefit everyone. This would nevertheless require a courageous change of attitude on the part of political leaders.